The Longest War (63 page)

Sadritdin Jalilov

Said Jawad

Sterling Jensen

Seth Jones

Sydney Jones

Peter Jouvenal

Fred Kagan

Hekmat Karzai

Rita Katz

Art Keller

Jack Keane

John Kerry

Mullah Abdul Samad Khaksar (Assassinated in Kandahar in 2006)

Jamal Khalifa (Murdered in Madagascar in 2007)

Rhamad Khan

Ismail Khan

Jamal Khashoggi

Khalid Khawaja (Assassinated by Taliban in 2010)

David Kilcullen

Daniel Kimmage

Osama bin Laden (In hiding)

Arif Lalani

William Lambert

Robert Lambert

Patrick Lang

Carie Lemack

Clare Lockhart

Douglas Lute

Norine MacDonald

Jean MacKenzie

Michael Maloof

Michele Malvesti

Omar Khan Masoudi

Ahmad Shah Massoud (Assassinated in Afghanistan in 2001)

Brett McGurk

John McLaughlin

Richard Melton

Joseph Melrose

John Miller

Khary Miller

Hamid Mir

Assaf Moghadam

Haji Deen Mohammed

Saad Mohseni

Vahid Mojdeh

Rolf Mowatt-Larssen

Philip Mudd

Ursula Mueller

Abdul Hakim Mujahid

Mohammed Musa

Wakil Ahmed Muttawakil

Muzhgan

John Nagl

Syed Mohsin Naqvi

Octavia Nasr

Vali Nasr

Maajid Nawaz

Shuja Nawaz

Raymond Odierno

Michael O’Hanlon

Abu Omar (Osama Hassan Mustafa Nasr)

Meghan O’Sullivan

Ralph Paredes

David Petraeus

William Pierce

George Piro

Kenneth Pollack

Mohammed Asif Qazizanda

Amir Rana

Ahmed Rashid

Joel Rayburn

Bruce Riedel

Nic Robertson

Michael A. Rolince

Eric Rosenbach

Barnett Rubin

Osama Rushdi

Thomas Ruttig

Marc Sageman

Omar Samad

Habiba Sarabi

Michael Scheuer

Michael Semple

Mohammed al-Shafey

Michael Sheehan

Mitch Silber

Steven Simon

Yasser al-Sirri

Julie Sirrs

Emma Sky

Leonid Smirnov

Ali Soufan

Armando Spataro

Frank Sturek

Barbara Sude

Abu Musab al-Suri (Mustafa Setmariam Nasar—captured in 2005, now jailed, location not known, perhaps Syria)

Jassim Suwaydawi

Camille Tawil

Frances Fragos Townsend

Tom Tullius

Ben Venzke

John Vines

Hussein al-Wadi

Doug Wankel

Dale Watson

Matthew Waxman

Gabriel Weimann

Mary Jo White

Andy Worthington

Daoud Yacub

Judith Yaphe

Jameel Yusuf

Rahimullah Yusufzai

Asif Zadari

Mohammed Zahir

Mohammed Haji Zahir

Ahmed Zaidan

Juan Zarate

Montasser al-Zayyat

Notes
 

1
“As a general rule”
: Christopher Andrew,
For the President’s Eyes Only
(New York: Harper Collins, 1996), p. 538.

1
“No one loves”
: Maximilien Robespierre, “On the War,” Speech to the Jacobin Club, Paris, January 11, 1792.

3
a riddle
: Yosri Fouda and Nick Fielding,
Masterminds of Terror: The Truth Behind the Most Devastating Attack The World Has Ever Seen
(New York: Arcade, 2003), p. 140.

3
turned down
: National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States Final Report (Washington, D.C.: 2004) (“9/11 Commission Report,”), p. 168.

3
“Jenny”
: Fouda and Fielding,
Masterminds of Terror
, pp. 158, 139.

4
dispatched a messenger
: ibid. pp. 140–141.

4
trainers at the facility said
: Musad Omar is a Yemeni being held at Guantánamo Bay. Omar claims to have gone to Afghanistan “to observe the situation” under the Taliban after being recruited to do so by an acquaintance in Yemen. In extracts from his testimony before a U.S. military tribunal at Guantánamo he recalls what it was like to be in al-Qaeda’s camps around the time of the 9/11 attacks. He says he saw bin Laden in Khost in mid-October 2001 a month before the fall of Kabul on November 12, 2001. Guantánamo Bay tribunal transcripts. Author’s collection.

4
In Kandahar
: According to Abu Musab al-Suri, the Syrian jihadist who had sometimes had clashed with bin Laden, in September 2001, the al-Qaeda leader told some of his followers that it was time to leave Kandahar and go back to Yemen. Abu Musab al Suri,
The Call for Global Islamic Resistance
, published on jihadist websites, 2004.

4
Feroz Ali Abbasi
: Feroz Ali Abbasi, Guantánamo Bay Prison Memoirs, 2002–2004.

4
Lindh heard an instructor
: FBI report, “Interview of John Philip Walker Lindh,” December 9–10, 2001. Author’s collection.

4
Atyani asked bin Laden
: Bakr Atyani, phone interview, Islamabad, Pakistan, August 22, 2005.

4
an open secret
: Vernon Loeb, “U.S. forces in Gulf on highest alert; threats also prompt travel warning,”
Washington Post
, June 23, 2001.

4
tightly held
: 9/11 Commission Report, p. 532 fn 180. According to KSM, only bin Laden, Mohamed Atef, Abu Turab al-Jordani, Ramzi Binalshibh, and a few of the senior hijackers knew the specific targets, timing, operatives, and methods of attack. Intelligence reports, interrogations of KSM, Oct. 27, 2003.

4
formally contracted its alliance
: 9/11 Commission Report, op. cit., p. 470, fn. 82: Intelligence report, interrogation of KSM, Jan. 9, 2004.

5
learned about the attacks
: Osama bin Laden, December 13, 2001, op. cit.

5
for a suicide mission
: Osama bin Laden, December 13, 2001, op. cit.

5
suicide “wills”
: Fouda and Fielding op. cit., p. 141; Such tapes were released in April 2002, September 2002, September 2003, and September 2006. Joel Roberts, “Video shows bin Laden, 9/11 hijackers,” CBS News, September 7, 2006,
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/
09/07/terror/main1982773.shtml
.

5
Despite his increasing militancy
: Terry McDermott,
Perfect Soldiers: The 9/11 Hijackers: Who They Were, Why They Did It
(New York: HarperCollins, 2005), pp. 50–53; “personality clashes”: 9/11 Commission Report op. cit., p. 246; “the Ayatollah”: McDermott,
Perfect Soldiers
, p. 37.

5
“How do you feel?”
: Yosri Fouda interview with Ramzi Binalshibh, Karachi, Pakistan, April 20–21, 2002. Aired in Al Jazeera documentary, September 11, 2002.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/sep/09/
september11.afghanistan
.

5
“Holy Tuesday”
: Yosri Fouda, “We left out nuclear targets, for now,”
The Guardian
, March 4, 2003,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/mar/
04/alqaida.terrorism
.

5
three or four floors
: Tape transcript available from CNN.com, December 13, 2001.
http://archives.cnn.com/2001/U.S./12/13/tape.transcript/
. The tape was translated by George Michael, a translator at Diplomatic Language Services and Dr. Kassem M. Wahba, of Johns Hopkins University for the Department of Defense.

6
gathered around radios
:
United States of America
v.
Ali Hamza Ahmad Sulayman al Bahlul.
Obtained through
www.findlaw.com
.

6
“Be patient”
: Osama bin Laden, mid-November 2001, Kandahar, Afghanistan.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,40750,00.html
.

6
“Our brother Marwan”
: Fouda, Yosri. “Top Secret: The Road to September 11.” Al-Jazeera (Qatar). First aired: September 11, 2002. Author collection.

6
Binalshibh remembers
: Fouda and Fielding op. cit., p. 159.

6
understood that the game was up
: Interview by author with Vahid Mojdeh, Kabul, Afghanistan, April 2006.

6
“As evidence he”
: Abu Walid al-Masri,
The History of the Arab Afghans from the Time of their Arrival in Afghanistan until their Departure with the Taliban.
Serialized in
Al Sharq al Awsat
, December 8–14, 2004.

6
“was not convinced”
: ibid.

7
There were others
: 9/11 Commission Report, op. cit., pp. 251–252.

7
would be counterproductive
: Peter Bergen and Paul Cruickshank, “The Unraveling,”
The New Republic
, June 11, 2008. Noman Benotman, interview by author, London, UK, August 30, 2005.

7
known bin Laden
: Benotman interview op. cit.

7
wanted to rein him in
: Vahid Mojdeh,
Afghanistan under Five Years of Taliban Sovereignty
, translated by Sepideh Khalili and Saeed Gangi (Kabul, 2001).

7
put bin Laden on notice
: 9/11 Commission Report, p. 251–252.

8
“Sheikh, if you give in”
: Omar bin Laden, Najwa bin Laden, Jean Sasson,
Growing Up Bin Laden
(New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2009), p. 247.

8
the head of Ahmed Shah Massoud
: 9/11 Commission Report, p. 252.

8
wiry warrior
: Description of Massoud from author interview August 1993 northern Afghanistan.

8
one working helicopter
: Interview by author, Dr. Abdullah, Washington, D.C., September 2000.

9
the Massoud hit
: Description of Massoud’s assassination from Gary Schroen,
First In: An Insider’s Account of How the CIA Spearheaded the War on Terror in Afghanistan
(New York; Presidio Press, 2005), pp. 1–6.

9
about the Massoud assassination on the radio
: Feroz Ali Abbasi, op. cit.

9
worried that the Northern Alliance was finished
: Craig Pyes, and William C. Rempel, “Slowly stalking an Afghan lion,’”
Los Angeles Times
, June 12, 2002.
http://articles.latimes.com/2002/
jun/12/world/fg-masoud12
.

9
the most cosmic of terms
: Voice of America interview, “Mullah Omar,” September 21, 2001.

10
“A U.S. campaign against Afghanistan”
: Array of al-Qaeda Memos and Forgotten Computer Reveals Thinking Behind Four Years of al-Qaeda Doings,”
Wall Street Journal
, December 1, 2001. See also Alan Cullison, “Inside al-Qaeda’s Hard Drive,”
The Atlantic Monthly
, September 2004.

10
at least he was both pious and courageous
: Vahid Mojdeh,
Afghanistan Under Five Years of Taliban Sovereignty
, translated by Sepideh Khalili and Saeed Gangi (Kabul, 2001).

10
“I’m sure he didn’t do it”
: Faraj Ismail, interview by author, Cairo, Egypt, June 2005. The interview with Mullah Omar ran in
Al Majallah
on October 14, 2001.

10
longer than any conflict
: There is some debate about the exact length of the U.S.’s involvement in the Vietnam War, which can vary anywhere between eight years and one and a half decades depending on which start and end dates for America’s involvement are selected. According to Stanley Karnow’s authoritative history
Vietnam
, in February 1962, an American military assistance command was formed in South Vietnam, and by the end of 1963 15,000 American military advisers were there. A cease-fire agreement was formally signed in Paris in January 1973, and the last American troops left Vietnam two months later. Karnow’s account indicates that America’s role in the war lasted at least a decade.

10
could last for generations
: Ayman al-Zawahiri pointed out in his autobiography that it took two centuries to eject the Crusaders from the Middle East in the Middle Ages and it took almost as long to expel the French from Algeria in the 19th and 20th centuries.
Knights Under the Banner of the Prophet
, excerpts published by
Al Sharq al Awsat
, December 2001.

11
“When people see”
: Osama bin Laden, December 13, 2001, translation by the Department of Defense.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/
0,2933,40750,00.html
.

11
closest buddy
: Khaled Batarfi, interviews by author, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, September 5 and 9, 2005.

11
The Musharifa district
: author visits to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia September 5–9, 2006.

11
fasted twice a week
: Batarfi interview.

12
“He was frustrated”
: Khaled Batarfi, “First ever interview with the woman who brought up the world’s most wanted man,”
The Mail on Sunday
, December 23, 2001.

12
in the 1950s
: Bergen 2006, p. 72.